


The Alchemist

by chucklingChemist



Category: Original Work, Pathfinder (Roleplaying Game)
Genre: Backstory, Elves, Familial Abuse, Fantasy, Gen, Original Universe, Slice of Life, Unhappy Ending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-11
Updated: 2020-04-11
Packaged: 2021-03-02 00:48:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,231
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23586406
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chucklingChemist/pseuds/chucklingChemist
Summary: “Do you know why you’re here, child?”“You needed to talk about my studies."The daughter of a prestigious Elvish family rooted in sorcery has a path laid out for her through heritage and society. She, naturally, has a different plan in mind.(Backstory for my Pathfinder OC, Nika)
Comments: 2
Kudos: 2





	The Alchemist

**Author's Note:**

> Before I attempted (and failed, goddamn you Animal Crossing) to give myself a 30 day challenge, I had the random inspiration to write some of my roleplay OCs. First of whom being my alchemist elf who goes by many names, but initially went by Nika Aevollon. I might end up going back and doing more with this, since it was a lot of fun to write, but I haven't quite decided yet. Whenever I finally get sick of Animal Crossing I'll probably have a better idea.
> 
> The world is not mine, but rather the carefully homebrewed world of my DM. If I had to home build a whole world this would've taken even longer to post it.

Electricity crackled and sparked underneath the cold iron in Nika’s fingers. She watched as bright miniature bolts shot off from her delicate fingers, surging back and forth before dissipating with nowhere to go except the space around her. The sharp ozone smell filled her nostrils, as if in warning. Today though, she wasn’t going to worry about it; Nika’s family might all be natural adepts, but that didn’t mean she had to push her limits. 

Then again, just because her family were adepts didn’t necessarily mean she herself was. Nika was an Aevellon, a prestigious Elvish family chosen by elementals from right at birth, if not beforehand in some complex cosmic sense. The bond affected most aspects of the child, from their preferences and personality down to their physical appearance. Some time during childhood, the bond manifested into magical power. Functionally, it makes all Aevellons technically “naturally adept”. It was how bright eyed, chirpy, white-haired Nika could end up with a brother with dark hair and darker blue eyes and a voice who gave off an air of mystery to anyone who wasn’t her. The elemental spirit of thunder simply chose her the same way water chose her brother years ago. The difference was her brother’s magical abilities manifested when he was still a toddler. Nika’s abilities didn’t develop until a few years ago, at age ten.

Her father insisted she was a late bloomer and lucky to develop magic. Her mother, meanwhile, believed her to be a victim of nothing more than her inability to practice and study, luck be damned. She wasn’t sure which was worse.

“Imolnyiara.”

The stern voice hit her like a wave crashing brutally on her head, jolting her attention from her magic to the imposing figure approaching her. The iron bar slipped from her hands and collided with the wood floor with a muffled clang. She grimaced, equally annoyed at the noise and the looming figure dressed in deep blues. Her brother, Pascallon, approaching her could mean anything. But of anything it could mean for her it wasn’t _good_.

“I told you not to call me that!” she said. “I’m Nika.”

Pascallon narrowed his eyes. “To any friends you have, maybe,” he scoffed. “But I’m not your friend. I’m your family.”

“You’re my brother,” she said. _Not even that much older than me_ , she added silently. Four years wasn’t enough to make him a third parent. 

“Your older, matured brother who understands children cannot just give themselves names,” he added coolly. “Besides, Imolnyiara is a fine name. To shrug it off for something as banal as Nika is childish.”

Nika fought off the instinct to wince at him using the name again. Imolnyiara was her “real” name, yes. It was also a name she loathed -- between the near impossibility of spelling it when she was a kid, the absolute mouthful it sounded when anyone tried to say it, and sharing it with the last Aevellon who bonded with a thunder elemental who actually was a natural adept. 

By contrast, Nika was short. Sweet. Original. Not confined traditions or norms and carrying a reputation to uphold.

She resisted the temptation to roll her eyes. There was no point having this conversation with him. He knew her reasons. He simply refused to listen to her. “What did you need me for anyway? I was actually practicing my magic this time.”

Pascallon’s dark gaze flickered down to the iron bar. Any electrical current coursing through it died off some time ago. He picked it up silently and twisted it around his fingers for a few seconds, frowning. “While I’m glad you packed up that useless alchemy kit, parlor tricks do not make a sorcerer in any respect.”

“They weren’t parlor--!”

He held a gloved hand up, silencing her immediately. That’s what it meant when Pascallon put his hand up. All arguments were over. “Were you actually _doing_ anything, or were you just making sparks bounce for your personal enjoyment again?”

Nika opened her mouth to retort, as anyone should when asked a question, but was met with a swift glare that turned her blood to ice. 

Right. No arguing. No discussion. Gods forbid someone _challenge_ him. Last time she was stupid enough to do that, he stole her alchemical equipment. _For her own good_ , he claimed. 

She ended up stealing it back. With Pascallon going to the college, rummaging through his room while he disappeared was easy enough and it only took an hour of delicately digging through his belongings and returning them to their previous state. She still has no idea if he knew or simply assumed she wouldn’t try.

She swallowed down any bubbling frustration in her throat just long enough to ask, “What did you need me for, Pascallon?” 

His lips curled into a thin smile. “Mother and father have requested your presence in the study. They wish to address some concerns involving your schooling.”

_What schooling_ , Nika thought grimly. Not as if her parents helped her in any way. The general studies tutors moved too slowly for her, but she also wasn’t allowed to look ahead or move “beyond her skill”. She’s only ever had one magic tutor, a rather dour and slow-speaking man intent on belittling her every accomplishment by reminding her of her brother’s achievements. How young he is, yet how accomplished. How he’s apprenticing under one of the most prestigious wizards in the city. How he’s done so much with so little time, yet at the rate she’s going she’ll amount to nothing.

After three sessions of failing to make a simple pebble glow, he ended up declaring her a lost cause in a huff and stopped showing up to her lessons. Never told her parents, either. If he did, they would stop paying him. She had to find other ways to occupy the time. Other ways, which of course ended up being perusing through the shops and traveling merchants for anything interesting. It was there she found a grizzled sea elf selling basic alchemist’s tools, complete with a handwritten book of simple potion recipes.

By the time her parents expected her back, she had created her first potion with only the materials she could find around her.

Her parents knew about the former issue. Granted, they felt the issue was wholly Nika being melodramatic, but both of them were aware of her breadth of knowledge and distaste in the tutor’s speed. The latter, she didn’t think they knew anything about. Even Pascallon only knew about the experiments performed in her free time. No, it had to be about her magical progress.

Or well, her apparent lack thereof. Something her brother knew, and her distant parents had supposedly never found out about.

“Oh. Well…” her voice faltered for a second as the possibility of whatever her parents wanted overtook her for a second, “are they just in the study?”

He didn’t answer. He only said, “They instructed me to come with you.”

Nike only nodded in response. Did she fully believe it? No. But Pascallon was quite obviously not in the mood to listen to reason, and Nika’s mood was tanking by the second as anxiety took over.

Her silence caused him to smile, but this one felt less smug and more pleased than before, as if happy she did what he asked without argument for once. It almost made her want to say something, just to wipe it right off his face.

“Well, if you have no objections we shouldn’t keep them waiting. It could make them disappointed.”

Without another word, he turned on his heel toward the back of the house. The dark green and blues of his robes billowed like Nika presumed churning waves on a stormy sea looked like. On anyone else, it would look impossibly cool. On him it looked pretentious. 

She kept pace with him as they moved through the dark halls, lagging just enough to stay behind him. He may be as lithe as any other elf, but the empty hallways were barely wide enough for the both of them as it is. The last thing Nika wanted on top of her racing heart was a good dosage of claustrophobia too. And if Pascallon cared about her technically lagging behind, he didn’t bother to comment. 

A blessing. As little as she wanted to be in her own thoughts at the moment, she’d take that over him talking over her the whole walk any day.

He stopped abruptly at the end of the hall, next to wide, intricately carved double doors. She knew these doors. They were the entrance to the library. It was the only place in the house that felt grand without feeling overly spacious, earthly and comfortable while giving her space to breathe. Nooks and crannies to hide in, large windows to stream arcane light from Wellspring’s center. And books. Lots of them. She still distinctly remembered the book on the biological sciences tucked away in a back corner, away from everything. The one place she spent more time in than her own bedroom. 

Her heart jumped into her throat. For so many years now, the library was the one place she felt safe in their house. The large windows looking out to the outside world, the cozy armchairs tucked away into little nooks next to towering bookshelves. Elegant rugs draped the floors and muffled the sound. In their library she could hide away and no one would ever know.

Why would they want to talk to her in the library?

She looked up at her brother, expression etched with equal parts concern and confusion. Pascallon looked unconcerned. With hands clasped around his torso, he cocked an eyebrow in response and said, “Your words, Imolnyiara.”

Nika scowled for a second, silently letting her gaze move onto the door ahead of her. “It’s nothing,” she said. Her expression dropped into a more somber one. Her heart thumped loudly in her ears. With a couple breaths to steady her worried mind, she reached for the doorknob.

Instead of grabbing it, the door swung open wholly on its own, causing her to learn forward and stumble into the empty space. She grabbed at the air in front of her, managing to grip the knob and steady herself. Pascallon snickered behind her.

Her cheeks burned as she whipped her head around to shoot daggers at him. He didn’t even bother to hide his guilt: the once closed hands were now open, fingers still twitching from his last spell.

Figures.

“Imolnyiara. Stop playing with your brother and come here.” 

The sound of her mother’s voice, combined with the soft click of the door, erased all thoughts of Pascallon. She hurriedly smoothed down her pale blue dress and straightened up her figure, head bowed. Her mother’s patience could only be tested for so long. Nika didn’t want to hit that limit.

Nika’s parents were both firmly engrossed in the political and influential lives of Wellspring. Her mother Bascalli was a financial advisor for the city, working closely in particular with any elves coming in from foreign countries and preventing the trade of stolen goods. Meanwhile, her father Richten worked the social side. He was the pleasant, jovial face to Bascalli’s no-nonsense attitude and he knew it. Richten hosted parties at the family’s countryside home, away from the kids, to help strengthen ties with their family and the rest of the upper class. There wasn’t a person Nika knew of, aside from herself, that truly disliked him. But who could blame them? If your family thinks their children should be seen and not heard, it doesn’t affect the other adults in the slightest.

It was impressive, truly, how well the both of them managed to root themselves despite the family having lived deep in Arquenya, largely away from the rest of society, for generations. Until recently, they generally kept both a home on the outskirts of the Arcane University and another, smaller one closer to Wellspring. Keep their foot in the door at both locations, in case tragedy struck one of them. Her grandparents were the ones who began to lay the groundwork for a complete societal reintegration to Wellspring, and it had been Bascalli and Richten who finished it. They still had their quirks, and she’s sure they’ve rubbed off on her and Pascallon to some degree, but for the most part none of the other adults bothered to point it out.

“Do you know why you’re here, child?”

Nika moved her head up just enough to look up at her parents. Her mother looked as impassive as usual in her lavender robes, amber eyes boring holes right into her core while Nika stood there. Her father, meanwhile, was absent as usual. He probably had something else to attend to and pawned the meeting off to Bascalli. Said elf sat in a plush violet chair normally specifically used nearby the desks against the windows. It was the only chair that was moved. The rest remained scattered next to desks and bookshelves where they normally resided. The message was obvious: she would be required to stand for this meeting.

“You needed to talk about my studies,” she said.

Bascalli nodded. “It seems you can pay attention long enough to process that at least,” she said. “I have received word your magical capabilities have stunted. Is this true?”

Nika pursed her lips, unsure how to answer. She still used her magic, sometimes. When she needed to get a fire started for boiling water, electricity worked as well as anything else to get a fire started. Had she practiced much else since her tutor left? No. The only other spell she ever learned the methodology for was how to detect magic, but with so much magic in Wellspring there was no telling if her spell actually worked, or if her mind was tricking her into detecting it. She most certainly hadn’t learned any new spells in the three years since she was able to properly use her first spell. Maybe she _was_ stunted. Maybe _that_ was her problem.

She opened her mouth to answer, but Bascalli had already pressed on. “I suppose it can’t be helped. Having two competent children would be too much to ask for. Still, I can’t help but shake the feeling you aren’t trying.”

“But I--”

“Even an incompetent Aevellon would have more than one spell in their domain in three years time.” She stood up from her chair, long skirts pooling on the floor. “And can I even say you have the one, when you can barely perform it?”

“I’m doing well in my general studies,” she pointed out.

Bascalli sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose. “Imolnyiara, you are a nuisance to the tutor. She has informed me about your disrespect toward the material, how you pester her with additional questions of no importance to the lesson. And now, you sit in your history lessons scribbling away at inane ideas rather than pay attention.” She looked back up at Nika with a frown. “Do you even realize how important it is to know of our struggle with the dwarves, or do you simply throw it away like everything else?”

“Yes, mother.”

Bascalli quirked a delicate eyebrow. “Yes, you realize the importance, or yes you throw it away like everything else?”

“Yes, I realize its importance.” 

She could still hear her tutor in her head, telling her about the blatant hypocrisy of the dwarves for refusing to share their arcane technologies yet insisted Wellspring open its walls. Every single step leading up to the declaration of war -- later called the First War of Strife -- from the dwarves and the subsequent century-long war played out, rapid-fire, in her head verbatim. Even her tutor’s takeaway from the whole lesson rang clear: the dwarves will inevitably suck their allies and the world dry. 

Which she thought was ridiculous. Maybe she didn’t care about politics enough (and she really, truly didn’t care), or zoned out during the part where they explain the logic behind the thought properly, but it sounded like there were distinct missing steps. At the very least, if she applied the same logic to her brother, it sounded like the type of thought process to get her in trouble with her parents.

“Then please explain to me why this--” she reached into a partly-obscured pocket in her skirt, pulling out a folded piece of paper “--is what you focused on instead of that lesson.”

Nika’s eyes widened. No. She remembered _exactly_ what she was writing during the last couple lessons about the war. She had spent the day earlier working with combustibles, testing various materials for flammability under various conditions. That specific paper in her mother’s hands was a list of reactants used and degree of success. It had been a precursor to working on explosives, as the recommended reagent for a basic bomb required ingredients unavailable to her and she’d have to find ways around it.

“Where did you find that? That was in my--” she stopped herself, the words _field journal_ caught in her throat. If her mother found loose notes about her experimentation, she likely already knew. But she still held out hope for some level of plausible deniability out of all this. _Field journal_ , as her alchemy book recommended keeping, would imply more than casual investigation due to boredom. She swallowed down the words and instead muttered, “my notebook.”

“Imolnyiara, notebook or not you cannot begin to pretend how this is impacting your studies. How am I supposed to believe you are paying attention when you are so insistent on working on,” she paused to open it up, and Nika’s gaze dropped to the floor just so she wouldn’t have to see the disappointment and annoyance cloud her mother’s eyes and sneered, “ _explosive reagents_.”

Nika didn’t answer. What was there to say? That she read it wrong? That it wasn’t what she thought it was? It was for another studies course? Even if it wasn’t a lie, her mother never believed her when she told the truth. Why would she do so now?

“Child. Stop being petulant and answer me.” There was a sharp clicking of heels on stone as Bascalli marched over to Nika, so close Nika could smell the overly-floral perfume. She pressed a sharp nail against the bottom of Nika’s chin and _pushed_. Nika gritted her teeth as the sting blossomed until finally she tilted her head up at Bascalli. A small smile tugged at her mother’s lips due to her obedience, but only for a second. The second she seemed to realize Nika was paying attention it dropped back into an impassive frown.

“And do look at your elders when they address you. It’s disrespectful.”

“Yes, mother.”

The smile returned, more smug than before. She took enough steps to once again give Nika some level of space, albeit not enough to make her feel comfortable, as she started to pace once more. “Now, once again. Why did you seem to think it was appropriate to study explosive reagents? More importantly, is your magical heritage truly so unimportant to you that you will throw it away to become the cheap imitation of a sorcerer, relying on one time tricks to do something your ancestors could do effortlessly for centuries?”

She went to speak again, but Bascalli continued, sharp voice reverberating through the room. “If you devoted half as much time to practicing your magic as you do setting things on fire, you would at least be adequate. Not at your brother’s level, but passable. But this?” She dropped the paper, letting it float unceremoniously down to the floor. “This is unacceptable. Do you understand that?”

Nika’s body stiffened as Bascalli spoke in an attempt to stop her whole body from shaking. “But Mother, the tutor--”

“Stop it child.” She turned around on her heel, skirts flaring out around her as she strode back to her chair and sat. “You’re thirteen, almost a young woman. It’s about time you start taking responsibility for your failing education.”

“But--!”

“No. Buts.” She paused for a while to take a few heavy breaths before she ground out, “Or is even _that_ too difficult for you?”

Nika swallowed down the anger bubbling over in her voice, forcing it back down to the pit of her stomach. “Yes. I do.”

This time, she wasn’t given a smile in response. Her mother leaned forward, steepling her fingers and drumming them together in time to Nika’s pounding heart. “So you understand that you will get punished?”

Nika nodded slowly. “Yes.”

“Yes…?”

“Yes, mother,” she sighed.

She watched Bascalli’s amber eyes narrow at her sigh, as if judging if that was yet another instance of disrespect, but for whatever reason she chose to ignore it and relaxed in the chair. “Good.” Her arms dropped from their current position, instead folding them neatly in her lap. “Your father and I will be going through your bedroom and confiscating any alchemical materials you might have acquired through nefarious means. Thankfully we shouldn’t be in there very long as your brother informed us how exactly you were hiding it from us.

“Afterward, you will be confined to your room to practice your magic during studies and restricted to remaining in the house the rest of the time. Pascallon has graciously donated his time to keep an eye on you and stop you from doing anything reckless. One way or another, we will get your life’s path set back on track.” Her voice softened as she added, “We’re just doing what’s best for you, Imolnyiara. Okay?”

Anger coursed through Nika’s veins like a fire. If she felt frustrated before, it was nothing like this. White hot rage, making her body jittery and jumpy, where the only thing that felt like it could fix it was screaming into the sky. Being told to stop practicing something was one thing. Having her forcibly removed, not just snatched by her brother, was another. And being a prisoner in her own home -- no, her own bedroom, as she knew exactly how that one would turn out -- was yet another thing altogether.

But she couldn’t scream. Couldn’t run out of the room. Couldn’t yell at her mother or her brother, couldn’t go to someplace or someone to vent her frustrations. She was stuck doing little more than blinking back tears of frustration and pushing down the lump in her throat to force out, “Okay.”

“Good.” Bascalli stood up again. With a short nod, she said, “You are dismissed.”

Nika’s head bobbed rapidly in acknowledgement before she whisked out of the room, not even bothering to shut the double doors behind her as she raced up the stairs and into her bedroom. She slammed the door shut in sheer frustration and crumpled to the floor. Keeping herself composed for that long must’ve drained her more than she realized. Enough so she couldn’t recall seeing if her brother was still standing outside the library when she left.

Her room looked barren. More so than usual. The usual components were there: her four poster bed, made just the way she always did, the circular aquamarine rug in the center of her floor remained. The arcane lights keeping her room at a continuous low dim continued as if nothing happened. Her drawers at least _looked_ untouched at the surface. But a quick glance proved Pascallon had already invaded. Her bookshelf didn’t have many books, but she remembered more than the few blandly-colored tomes that rested alongside the shelf edges. To say nothing of the notebooks. There were only a couple she immediately recognized, and they were all the ones she used exclusively for schoolwork. Every single one of the scattered papers on her desk, no matter what importance, was gone.

Weak sparks, no longer held back by her own willpower, crackled around her fingers. The last true sign of her anger. However, that too became too much and it petered off just as pathetically as it came in. 

With a heavy sigh, she heaved herself up onto her bed and under the covers. There were a thousand emotions she knew she should feel -- confusion, anger, despair, anything -- but none of them surfaced. No more than pure, bone aching exhaustion.

_I’ll feel it tomorrow_ , she thought as her eyes closed. Whenever tomorrow happened. Whenever she rested long enough to acknowledge some level of adequate time passage. Not like there were windows in her room. Or lights to stream through her windows, if she even had them. 

Well, there were _lights_ but not the kind like outside. No lights from any sun or stars, no moon to bathe her bed in its pale light while she slept. Just the same arcane light, day in. 

Night out. 

The next time her eyes opened felt like seconds. It couldn’t have been, logically. Seconds don’t result in sheets unceremoniously kicked off the bed and long, white hair sticking uncomfortably on her neck. Nika had passed out for minutes, maybe even hours. The type of nap -- or whatever sleep she had -- where waking up generally involved the long, groggy process of re-calibrating your whole system to the concept of wakefulness.

This time though, this time was different. She felt absolutely alert, one phrase repeating in her head like rolling thunder. 

_I need to get out of here._

**Author's Note:**

> As usual, if you wanna follow me on social media check out my [Tumblr](https://chuckling-chemist.tumblr.com/) or my [Twitter](https://twitter.com/stormscourge). I've also now got a [Pillowfort](https://www.pillowfort.social/chucklingchemist), which has been a long time coming but I haven't touched it much yet. So you know, check me out there if you happen to like this.


End file.
